JK2015

[O lady]

A reminder that JK entries close at midnight this Friday 6 March.

Please note the recent post on the website and FB:
Late entries after 6 March may be possible but only if maps and start times are available.
Start times after 6 March are very unlikely to be available for the elite courses. In particular we anticipate that M21E at least is unlikely to have any spare start slots on Days 2 and 3.

http://www.thejk.org.uk/jk2015/index.php?pg=257

JK Relay entries close at midnight on Sunday 15 March.

[RS]

Perusing the start lists for 21E as they stand ATM, out of 155 entries on men's, there are 31 entries for 1 day only. Surely (if it's allowed ) that cuts the list down and makes it easier to apply WRE rules.
Only 9 out of 108 on women's.

[Jon X]

Each day is a standalone WRE.
So the entries for each day need to be considered separately.
Agreed it would not make sense for anyone entered for the overall competition to find themselves on different classes on different days!
Currently on M21E there are 144 entries for day two and 138 for day three (some people are only doing one day for specific reasons, for instance the Belgian team have not entered day two and are intending to use day three as a selection race).
As suggested in this thread earlier, no final decisions on approach until after entries close this Friday.

Fair to say that anyone entered for M21E and not now intending to run (eg injured) would be doing the organisers a favour if they cancelled their entry by Friday so they do not affect the numbers considered when taking any decision....

[mharky]

Might be worth getting a note to that effect on the website and Facebook page

[RS]

"Fair to say that anyone entered for M21E and not now intending to run (eg injured) would be doing the organisers a favour if they cancelled their entry by Friday so they do not affect the numbers considered when taking any decision...."

Perhaps those on list who know they stand no chance of getting a place on Elite because of lack of necessary ranking points etc could let the selector/organiser know so they could be moved to an alternative course (eg if it's decided to have a SE and an E ) without the selector/organiser having to trawl through all the entries?

[mharky]

Not being able (e.g. injury) and not being "good" enough (e.g. ranking) are two different things though. It makes sense for non-runners to withdraw, this gets the most amount of people onto E1 and also stops gaps in the start-list. I don't think you should be advising people who aren't "good" enough to change down and run something else though. It's their free choice to run elite, whether it be E1 or E2 (or whatever they get called). The next course down is M21L, doesn't that still have 2 long days rather than a middle?

[graeme]

It's their free choice to run elite, whether it be E1 or E2 (or whatever they get called).

Agreed. But it may be that people who signed up on WR to run against the best wouldn't want to run E2. e.g. I'm looking forward to running middle elite, because first hand experience will help me planning middle WOC. I'm not doing long because I know I can't cope with a 1:15 map*. If it helps the organisers out of a hole to protect the integrity of the JK I could be persuaded to move.


* Yes, I am very old, but I couldn't read the damn thing *last* time I ran JK elite at Bigland!

[ba-ba]

National teams on the relay - competitive or non-comp?

[Homer]

National teams on the relay - competitive or non-comp?

Good question. This needs making absolutely clear BEFORE the event. I remember the confusion at the JK Relay the year before we last hosted WOC.

IMHO National teams (unless they all happen to be in the same club) should be non comp.

[mharky]

2.1 Eligibility
2.1.1 Only Clubs which are affiliated either to British Orienteering or to another member Federation of the IOF are permitted to enter team for the JK Relay Championships.

[graeme]

National teams on the relay - competitive or non-comp?

According to the rules, neither:

"Only Clubs which are affiliated either to British Orienteering or to another member Federation of the IOF are permitted to enter team for the JK Relay Championships."

A sufficiently silly rule that they're bound to ignore it and allow national teams, then find there's nothing about competitive or non-comp in the rules. Common sense suggests non-comp., regardless of the precedent from Gross' dodgy Estonian team.

[Scott]

Don't forget that there are also currently 81 M18/20E and 54 W18/20E competitors on Day 2 to be fitted onto the same courses (according to the current rules - I thought I sat in a meeting where it was decided to give the organisers the option of varying this, but I cannot now find any evidence of it). With Jon's numbers above, that makes 225 male elites to fit onto a single Middle course - presumably the organisers will be allowed to split 18/20E onto separate Middle courses from 21E.

There are 121 start slots for each Middle course anyway, so unless entries increase substantially before the deadline - which they might - fitting all the 21E entrants onto a single course on Day 2 by extending the start window a little shouldn't be too big an organisational problem, particularly as the last (top seed) starters on 21E Middle are likely to finish before the last (non-seeded) starters on the other age-class Long courses, even if the top elites start 45 minutes later. Or some 21E entrants could be seeded off onto 21Elite2 and share the 18/20E courses.

There are only 81 21E start slots for the Long day and a three-minute start interval, so stretching the start window is perhaps less feasible (unless you also reduce the interval). If the organisers do decide to seed competitors off, I really hope it is onto a 21Elite2 long course of equivalent length to SuperElite: if the seeding is perfect, this may well be won in substantially over 90min, but that is unlikely to be a surprise to any of the entrants.

Seeding 21E entrants off onto 21L on Day 3 would be the same as seeding entrants to an oversubscribed M55L off onto M55S, and I find it hard to see that happening at the JK these days - a second M55L2 course would be planned.

Hopefully Events and Competitions Committee are already considering putting some guidance in place to avoid organisers being put in similarly difficult positions in future. I'll certainly be writing to them to explain why I don't think "seed people off onto M21L" is a reasonable option...

[speaking, of course, as someone who will almost certainly be getting seeded off]

[Mr D]

Just checked the website, no details on the course lengths and entry closes tomorrow.

Any ideas of what the course distances/climb are roughly on each course?

Can I change courses once these details are published?


If not, people may run longer... i.e Long becomes Elite, Short becomes Long to compensate..

[mharky]

Scott, I thought it had been agreed that 18/20 elite would be on a different course. Partly due to start block restrictions, and partly as a middle race planned for 21 elites is not the correct distance for junior elites.

[graeme]

- I thought I sat in a meeting where it was decided to give the organisers the option of varying this, but I cannot now find any evidence of it).

They varied it at JK2014. There will be two elite courses*, the issue is whether the WR is split, and how to deal with the M18/20s is they end up sharing a course with WRE dropouts.


*Obviously I can't possibly know this, but as a prediction its not even worth half a coconut.